


Breaking the Surface

by RainLily13



Series: Tests of Virtue [3]
Category: Elementary (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-17
Updated: 2014-11-17
Packaged: 2018-02-25 17:00:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2629415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RainLily13/pseuds/RainLily13
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The waiting was the hard part. She could ignore the pain, mostly, but the worry, the anxiety—it ate at her incessantly. How long would it take him to figure it out? Would he find her clues? Would he even recognize them for what they were? Was Moriarty watching him? Should she have even left the clues in the first place?</p><p>It didn’t matter, in the end. The phone resting by her hand began to ring mere seconds later. Follows, <i>At Hope's Light</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Breaking the Surface

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I was supposed to post this so long ago. It’s the finale of my little Reichenswap series, following A Fall From Grace and At Hope’s Light, in that order. Best to read those first, though, you can find both of them here. Also, they are probably wildly ooc at the end especially, whoops. 
> 
> Originally posted on [ my tumblr ](http://crazyfuzzyedges.tumblr.com/post/102742199202/an-well-i-was-supposed-to-post-this-so-long-ago)

_One moment there was nothing but white hot pain, her throat tight under the vice grip of fear. Her shoulder was throbbing; at her ears, the wind whistled sharply as she dropped._

_The next, she was plunged into icy darkness, and she couldn’t have breathe even if she tried._

_It was the pain that kept her sharp, though—that allowed her to quickly regain enough focus to remain underwater, to kick off in the direction towards what she believed was the shore, swimming with the current instead of against it as it passed her along under the bridge._

_Hands found her, slipping under her arms and wrenching her up—she swallowed a scream and choked out some water—and the next sound to pass her lips was a pained groan of relief._

_Cracking her eyes open, she found the gray sky swimming above and dark eyes staring back at her, wide and worried._

_Alive. She was still alive._

* * *

When all was said and done, she reclined— _slowly,_ almost  _Clyde_  slow—on the cot, two pillows stacked up against her back to prop her up, and she shut her eyes with an unsteady exhalation.

She couldn’t rest. She was so  _exhausted_ but sleep escaped her—an unusual phenomenon, but understandable one considering the circumstances.

When the burner cell beside her vibrated, Joan Watson grimaced. Her jaw clenching against the pain, she flipped it open to answer, set it to speaker, and then spoke, not bothering to check the caller id. “You got my message,” she stated, relieved.

There was a pause, and for a split second her heart raced— _she couldn’t have—_ but the voice she was hoping for finally spoke up.  _“…Ah, well,”_ came Sherlock roughly, and Joan’s breath hitched a bit at the raw emotion she could detect in those first two words before he cleared his throat and continued,  _“You left quite the trail, Watson. I couldn’t help but follow.”_

Her lips twitched. Joan let her eyes to slide shut as she shifted into a more comfortable position, grimacing as white-hot pain sparked in her shoulder. “I kind of worried you wouldn’t notice,” she murmured, her voice coming out as a rasp. “I didn’t know how else to let you know without…” Helplessness overcame her, and her fingers tightened around the cell.

 _“I would have, eventually,_ ” Sherlock smoothly interjected, and from the briskness of his tone and short, sharp breaths, Joan could tell he was either pacing or walking—likely the former. _“If I hadn’t knocked it over and discharged its contents, I would have wondered why you left it in the first place. First things first though— **are you alright**?”_

She paused, her eyes widening at the anxiety, the urgency lacing through his voice. “Yeah,” she breathed out, an unbidden smile playing on her lips. There was another pause as she reconsidered and winced. “Well, kind of, my shoulder hurts like hell right now, but it’s better than an actual bullet wound. I wasn’t sure if the vest would stop it from that close of range.” Gently pulling at the collar of her shirt, Joan checked her bandage, seeing a speckle of red bleeding through and the large bruise that peeked out from underneath it.

_“Hence the blood thickeners.”_

“Yeah. And the painkillers. What can I say? A girl’s gotta be prepared,” she tried to joke.

_“I… there are no words to express how glad I am that you were. Nor how proud.”_

A soft chuckle passed through her lips, though it was tinged with pain. “You say the sweetest things,” she teased, but her words were genuine. Joan’s smile faltered and she looked to the ground, biting her lip. “Sherlock?”

_“I’m coming.”_

Her gaze moved to stare at the dark ceiling above her, and she breathed out a grateful thanks before the call ended. 

* * *

As the door opened and a familiar figure slipped in, Joan straightened. “You weren’t—“

“Followed?” Sherlock cut her off, striding across the room towards her. “No, of course not, you know me better than that.” His eyes scoured her resting form, assessing and then zeroing in on her shoulder, all but burning a hole through the white fabric that peeked out from under her collar.

Joan’s lips pursed. Oh, she  _did_  know. But Moriarty… “I’m fine,” she said, discarding that last train of thought. “It hurt, like  _a lot_ , I honestly don’t know how you didn’t immediately want to go to the hospital when Proctor shot you that one time, and it barely even broke the skin.”

“I have a very high tolerance level for pain,” he informed her matter-of-factly.

Joan’s mouth quirked. “So I’d gathered,” she murmured wryly. “And yeah, hitting the water after that swan dive was a shock like no other, and the current was pretty rough, but Alfredo was watching out for me.”

“You informed him?” Sherlock asked sharply, the  _‘and not me?’_ silent and heavily implied.

Joan let out a helpless shrugged. “He was with me when I got Moriarty’s message. She said she’d know if I contacted anyone. I didn’t…” she trailed off, shaking her head. “Anyways, you don’t have to worry about me right now.”

Sherlock nodded, though a little jerkily. “I know,” he replied, as if it was obvious. “You wouldn’t have lied to me—and I would have been able to tell.” He shrugged uselessly. “I just…” He fidgeted at her bedside, fingers twitching uselessly. “I know it’s not entirely par the norm, but considering the circumstances, would you allow me to—?”

Joan’s eyes narrowed before they widened. “Oh,” she breathed out, and Sherlock had this bashful, almost awkward look about him. Rolling her eyes, she grabbed his hand and tugged. Honestly. “Oh, come here,” she said, pulling him down.

The embrace itself was awkward—not in the fact that they were actual making the most intimate form of personal contact they had yet in the course of their relationship, but because it was hard for Joan to get a good hug in with Sherlock bent at the waist and hovering over her bed as he was while she was reaching up, trying to wrap an arm around his gangly form while being mindful of her injured shoulder.

It seemed that Sherlock realized that it wasn’t going to work either, as he shifted until he was sitting on the edge of her bed, and their arms fell into place around the other’s waist.

His voice, rough and low and  _heavy,_ sounded by her ear in a whisper. “You had me very, very worried Watson.”

It was an understatement of epic proportions.

Joan let out a shuddering breath, flashing back to the bridge, to the pressure of the gun against her shoulder, to the split-second of white, agonizing pain—to Sherlock’s stricken gaze, to his outstretched hand and reaching fingers as she let herself tip over the edge and fall into the churning, icy water below…

She buried her face into his neck, sagging into his embrace. “Sorry I took your fake blood,” Joan breathed out shakily.  _Sorry for worrying you. Sorry for not warning you. Sorry for putting you through all of this._

A hand gently smoothed its way across the span of her back and Sherlock let out a little huff, amused.  “It was collecting dust in the closet anyway.”

_It’s fine. I’m just glad you’re here._


End file.
